September 23, 2007

"Every African leader I talked to, every single one when I was there, without any prodding from me, said, 'For God sakes, I hope Hillary wins. We don't like disliking America here,'" Bill Clinton said at a fund-raiser for her last month.

"I called the outgoing French president, and he said, 'Oh, tell me Hillary's going to win. I'm so tired of disliking America,'" Bill Clinton told the crowd.

Bill Clinton also quoted the immediate past prime minister of Singapore as saying, "'Please tell me Hillary's going to win. We need America leading the world again.'"

Aides to Jacques Chirac, the former French president, and Goh Chok Tong, Singapore's former prime minister, told The News they could not confirm Bill Clinton's assertions - and, they said, it's general policy to stay out of other countries' elections.

But the Daily News, reporting this, says "Yet none of the leaders the former President cited will back him up." So what are you saying, Bill Clinton's a liar? Oh, my.

But what does this lie/exaggeration/statement imply? Bill Clinton thinks we want to have the President that leaders of other countries will love the most, and we will believe that Hillary Clinton will inspire world love. That's all rather odd.

This is precisely what is wrong with the Dems: they want everyone (the world) to like us. They seem to see the world as a giant playground, where their self-esteem issues wil get sorted out by benevolent authority figures. I really don't want to be governed by over-grown middle-schoolers.

Or Mitt Romney. (Mitt is only in the middle of the pack in domestic likeability, but he fills the bill for the rest of the world - he looks damn good, is very smart, and speaks fluent French)

I hate to break it to Bill, but Hillary has these traits - her pandering, shakey ethics of expediency, abrasive voice...that have led Americans to judge she has the same level of warmth and attractiveness that ...well...Bill Clinton judged she has.

This should come as no surprise. Politicians say whatever they think they need to say to advance their interests. Some do it more shamelessly than others, that's all. Bill Clinton surpasses the rest for shamelessness, but it's a difference only of degree.

What he is saying is that they dislike all 300 million of us, but if Hillary is president, then they will like all 300 million of us. Because Bush is president, all of us are disliked? Wouldn't that also mean that they don't like the Americans named Bill and Hillary. After all, they are Americans, no?

What a loser. The Clinton Lackacy continues. A real American former President would have denounced such language. While foreign leaders amy like Hillary, good thing most Americans don't. This was the Party of Truman?

Can't you just imagine it? All these African leaders, their countries pleasantly accepting a steady flow of greenbacks from Uncle Sam, all begging for one candidate or another? Like they're really going to put that bet down on a horse that might just lose.

Presidential Aide in some African nation: "President N'Kruma! Senator Thompson just won the election! He'll remember what you said about wanting Hillary to win and shut off our foreign aid money!"

I have to agree that the lack of specific corroboration is a drawback. I've been wary of accepting Hillary's moral superiority in the past for one reason or another, and a good recommendation from Mugabe would really help seal the deal for me.

Odd? No. It's not even original. Kerry did the same thing in 2004, only he didn't name names. It's called international prestige, and some people value it.

And to the commentator who cited Romney as likeable, I voted for Romney (for gov), but even I don't LIKE Romney. No one likes Romney. He's teflon. Romney's appeal is limited to his executive administration skills, period.

We could get a whole lot of international prestige with all of the Muslim world by executing gays or women who have abortions, beating women for having sex outside of marriage, making Islam our national religion, and turning on the Israelis.

We could get a whole lot of international prestige by adopting a completely socialist and/or communist economic system, with all of the consequences that follow both in and out of the economic realm.

International prestige is vastly overrated. It has its value, but not nearly as high of a value as those who want us to subjugate ourselves to international whims suggest.

By the way, I like Teflon very much. I'm not too fond of Romney, but Teflon is da bomb.

I think its completely believable that those foreign leaders told Bill Clinton they want Hillary to win and I think its completely believable that they actually DO want Hillary to win. But I doubt they wanted Bill to announce those private sentiments to the world, hence the denial now. I don't think its a persuasive reason to vote for Hillary, but I doubt Bill is being dishonest about having actually been told that by many foreign leaders.

"Bill Clinton thinks we want to have the President that leaders of other countries will love the most, and we will believe that Hillary Clinton will inspire world love. That's all rather odd."

I think Clinton is right - Americans, on balance, DO want the rest of the world to love us - and none more than starry-eyed, Kumbaya liberal Democrats - as puppy-dog and childlike as that is. And, of course, it is odd that anyone thinks the Hillary!, of all people, will inspire world love toward America.

What the Hillary! will inspire, like any Democrat president would, is a standard Democrat foreign policy of overweening reliance upon ineffective if not corrupt international institutions like the UN and the EU. This, in turn, will inspire elected, unelected and dictatorial powers to leash American power, prestige and wealth like a sled dog to their own purposes, not ours. A weaker, less prestigious, defeated and poorer American will be unable to lead; liberal Democrat notions of leading by submission may work in their fantasies and in the late hours of the evening behind closed doors, but in the real world it is a highway toward irrelevancy and subjugation. Liberal Democrats strenuously disbelieve in American Exceptionalism; why any American would vote for a Democrat inspired by lesser visions of America is simply beyond reason.

That said, those subscribing to the infantile notion that America should seek to be beloved by the rest of the world should ask themselves what great power ever did, and what great powers do now? Does anyone anywhere really think the Chinese, Russians, or French for that matter give a rat's ass what anyone thinks of them, when their interests are at risk?

Clinton, of course, is savvy enough to exploit the simple-minded sentimentality of Democrat and swing-voters; I've no doubt enough Americans have an emotional enough view of international relations that this will be an issue in '08.

Bill is proud that our fake allies love Hillary. He would never hear such foul disrespectful remarks from a real ally like Australia. With hundreds of thousands of Americans buried in France, Clinton dishonors them by praising such remarks from a bastard frenchman. Again, another example of Bubba thinking he was greater than the Office.

I don't give a damn if the rest of the world loves us. Their "so called love" is fleeting, conditional, and in the long run gains us little to nothing. Now a healthy respect from our allies and some fear from our enemies - that gains us everything.

Why would the "outgoing" French President be important? That seems like a funny thing to highlight. A former head of state isn't exactly the world. France voted in a new President, who apparently likes America. It seems to me that the world showed itself tired of those who were anti-American.

Not sure the best way to garner even French support is by getting a blurb from Chirac. Sort of like a Republican trying to garner support by saying how much a candidate would be liked by Nixon.

Bill's story fits in with the left's pathetic desire to be liked by the media elites of Europe. No matter that the actual voters of France, Germany, and even Canada have elected leaders who do respect and like America.

My recollection is that this country gave up taking orders from foreign powers some time ago. Careful readers will notice that the paying of decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires only that Americans should declare the causes which impel them to a given course of action.

"Bill Clinton thinks we want to have the President that leaders of other countries will love the most, and we will believe that Hillary Clinton will inspire world love. That's all rather odd."

It really isn't all that odd when you consider why Hillary failed to divorce him after learning the truth about his adultery and his subsequent lies: Love.

She loves the big cheating lying philandering sexual-harassing lug who still makes her laugh. And, against any and all evidence, she needs to believe that he loves her. That's what she told us in her memoir, Living History: And Other Fabrications Of The Truth That, In My Unquenchable Desire For Power, I'm Willing To Deceive Myself Into Believing.

Bill Clinton is no dummy. He knows the world is tired of having Americans in the White House who are unlovable and un-fellate-able. What he's saying is this: Elect Hillary and I'll be back -- feeling the world's pain and loving the world the way only I know the world needs to be loved. The way I love Hillary. The way I love to let LuckyOldSun give me blow jobs.

I think that what's going on here is that the EU has all sorts of post-colonial special relationships with various EU states and these nations really can't afford to publicly like somebody their european patrons publicly loathe. Africa will eventually come out of the shadow of its past but we're not there yet.

President Bush has done an awful lot for Africa but it's a drop in the bucket compared to what the EU can do *to* Africa if African states offend them. This is a power dynamic that Bill Clinton no doubt knows very well and has misleadingly exploited for the benefit of his wife. He's turned an understandable expression not to want to be in the middle between the EU and the US into an endorsement of his wife's candidacy.

I think its believable that foreign leaders would support Hillary Clinton because (1) it is very well established that the U.S. was much more popular among foreigners ten years ago than today and that George Bush's foreign policy is a big factor in that change (2) many foreigners and their leaders probably think that the likely nominee of the party that would more significantly depart from George Bush's policies is the preferred candidate and (3) Hillary is seen as a proxy for a return to a popular former president, which is somewhat true among some Americans but is much more true among foreigners who have a more simplistic understanding of U.S. politics.

I think its believable that foreign leaders would tell Bill Clinton they support Hillary Clinton because (1) she is, everything considered, the likely next president, (2) she is the spouse of the person they are talking to so it may just be polite to say so, and (3) many probably DO support Hillary for the reasons I listed above.

I also think it is perfectly plausible that such foreign leaders would refuse to publicly confirm making such a statement preferring one candidate over another in a U.S. election.

I don't think the opinion of the conservative former president of France is a particularly compelling reason to vote for a candidate, but nor do I think the opinion of the conservative former prime minister of UK is, as the GOP seems a bit oddly obsessed with.

I just don't think it makes sense that Bill Clinton would make this up if its not true since it will inevitably lead to denials and refusals to confirm.

Debate all you want but you'll have to look to something other than hard statistics to help you. See, e.g., the Global Attitudes Project of the Pew Research Center, a survey of popular opinion in 47 countries.

Just after 9 a.m. on Aug. 29, a group of U.S. airmen entered a sod-covered bunker on North Dakota's Minot Air Force Base with orders to collect a set of unarmed cruise missiles bound for a weapons graveyard. They quickly pulled out a dozen cylinders, all of which appeared identical from a cursory glance, and hauled them along Bomber Boulevard to a waiting B-52 bomber.

The airmen attached the gray missiles to the plane's wings, six on each side. After eyeballing the missiles on the right side, a flight officer signed a manifest that listed a dozen unarmed AGM-129 missiles. The officer did not notice that the six on the left contained nuclear warheads, each with the destructive power of up to 10 Hiroshima bombs.

That detail would escape notice for an astounding 36 hours, during which the missiles were flown across the country to a Louisiana air base that had no idea nuclear warheads were coming. It was the first known flight by a nuclear-armed bomber over U.S. airspace, without special high-level authorization, in nearly 40 years.

MACKINAC ISLAND, Mich. — Republican presidential candidates can't be any more clear: President Bush isn't welcome on the campaign trail.

Competing to succeed him, top GOP candidates Rudy Giuliani, Mitt Romney, Fred Thompson and John McCain barely utter Bush's name. They essentially ignore the lame-duck president, or give him only passing credit, as they rail against the status quo and promise to fix problems he hasn't solved.

Probes into the Gonzales era will continue. The departed A.G. is now looking for a private lawyer to represent him, according to two legal sources who asked not to be identified because of the matter's sensitivity.

Buddhist temples; bags of cash; "no controlling authority;" "too much iced tea;" Lincoln bedroom; repeated use and abuse of women; purloined White House furnishings; over a hundred contributors fleeing the country or pleading the Fifth; 47 associates convicted or pleaded guilty; Sandy Burgler; Microsoft lawsuit (triggered the dot.com crash and never went much of anywhere); lots of talk but no action on AIDS in Africa; lots of friends and relations chowing down at the White House; blue jeans in the White House ....

Probes into the Gonzales era will continue. The departed A.G. is now looking for a private lawyer to represent him, according to two legal sources who asked not to be identified because of the matter's sensitivity.

Great. Anonymous slander from the left, anonymous "because of the matter's sensitivity". I am sure that I could come up with a couple of attorneys who would anonymously advise Lucky to lawyer up too.

I don't mind it if the rest of the world would like us, but what I want is them to fear us, or at least to respect us. Fear is much more likely to make us safe than is being liked.

And, by the end of Clinton's term, whatever fear and respect that his (Republican) predecessors had built up had been squandered.

I am perfectly happy that there are despots and terrorists around the world who can't get to sleep at night worrying about what that crazy cowboy in the White House is going to do next, and wondering if they are on his short list.

He's revered throughout the world for his intellect, success, selflessness and honor.

Why not post your resume so we can compare.

Th Clinton hating is really, really getting to be OLD news...especially considering what we have in the White House right now.

You want to talk about "honorable?"

The throw in torture, wiretapping, misleading the American people, Gonzales, Rummy, 1,000's of dead American soldiers, 1,000's of wounded American soldiers and an ongoing war that's costing us billions of dollars and more lives every day, a sinking economy, a massive deficit, the dollar at it's lowest ebb...and all brought along by the asshole in the White House right now.

WHining about Bill or Hillary Clinton isn't going to make things better for American. And if you think we aren't suffering because of G.W.'s ineptitude...you need to up your meds.

Wanting Hillary to win in much of world has more to do with the tailspin that socialism is in than anything to do with BDS. France has teetered on the brink of becoming a communist country for more than sixty years- except that in the last election the socialists were trounced for the third time in a row and it looks like they are dead forever. In much of Africa, ordinary folk are totally sick of Afro-Communism, that bastard child of the sixties independence movements. They understand that it is a scabby cover for theft and misgovernment. If Hillary were to win, it would be a boost for socialists the world over. It would also be completely at odds with what is going on in the rest of the world.

Well I just returned from abroad and the disgust with the Bush Administration was amazing. And this is from co-workers who you would expect to be Republicans (white, rich, American males in the Finance industry).

The Clinton's are NOT beloved throughout the world. That is a DNC media fabrication.

I know business people who travel around the globe, and they all know that the Clintons are not held in such high regard. The whole "Bill Clinton is a rock star" is just US media bullshit.Bill Clinton is a womanizer with a twangy accent.

The Chinese communists like the Clintons. The Chi-coms study Hillary-- send lots of money her way.

I made the original comment and I cited and linked to an extensive Pew poll on the topic.

I found the link and read the research and while it does show some increase in negative feelings towards the US, you didn't mention the good things it pointed out as well - nor the complexity of the piece. It talks about environmental issues and AIDS and other matters having nothing to do with Bush's war in Iraq which is the main reason stated by liberals as the cause of their dislike. Granted other countries like to blame the world's environmental and health issues on the USA but there is little we can do about that - they are going to be pissed at us about something no matter what we do.

And the study only covered the period of 2002 to 2007. That is not 10 years, and it certainly is not 20 or 30. It is intellectually dishonest to claim that the US is more unpopular than ever.

And even if we are . . . tough. Like I said earlier in this thread, their love is fleeting and conditional.

NSC: "It is intellectually dishonest to claim that the US is more unpopular than ever."

Dude, you need to beef up on your reading comprehension skills. I did not say the US is more unpopular than ever. I said ten years ago we were more popular among foreigners than now, which is, as a general statement, absolutely true. My point was to suggest that the US was more popular during Bill Clinton's administration than the current administration and that foreigners, rightly or wrongly and based on a simplistic view of US politics, might look to Hillary Clinton as an alternative they approve of. Read what I said before you accuse me of intellectual dishonesty.

My real point is that what seems like the more defensible anti-Clinton angle to this story is not that Bill Clinton is lying, but that what he's saying shouldn't matter. I personally think it does matter that our allies respect and like us all sorts of reasons, but that is at least a more reasonable and interesting debate to have. Calling Bill Clinton a liar in this case is lazy and not very well reasoned. Conservatives can do better.

Fair enough, what I should have said was that it is intellectually dishonest to use the Pew Poll to say the USA is more unpopular than 10 years ago - since the poll is only good for at most five years AND you left out all sorts of reasons for that alleged increase in unpopularity

As to calling Bill Clinton a liar - well, you don't need to hear his Africa stories to know that is a fact - even being under oath doesn't stop him.

Also, if I read correctly (my bad reading comprehension skills nonwithstanding), I believe that the Pew poll said that throughout most of Africa the view of the USA was "overwhelmingly positive."

Most of them literally hate Bill & Hillary Clinton and would rather harp on them than address America's standing in the world.

BTW, I don't hate Bill. Hell I even voted for him the second time (before I found out he was a lying letch). And I do care about America's standing in the world. I just don't believe how much we are "loved" has a damn thing to do with that standing. We stand on principle or we don't stand at all. That is the kind of standing I want us to have.

LOS said Well, because he was President of the United States, dipstick.

Sigh...Lucky, I made a legitimate response and posed a valid counterpoint to which I was hoping you could respond to but as I see, in true fashion, name calling is the extent of your ability to have a discussion.

NSC: "Fair enough, what I should have said was that it is intellectually dishonest to use the Pew Poll to say the USA is more unpopular than 10 years ago - since the poll is only good for at most five years AND you left out all sorts of reasons for that alleged increase in unpopularity"

I don't think that's fair enough and I don't think your explanation makes my comment intellectually dishonest. I made a point about why foreigners might like Hillary Clinton and as part of that point claimed the US is less popular in the world today than ten years ago. When Enigmaticore asked me to back up that latter claim, I cited the Pew study, which only goes back five years. I don't have another study going back ten years to show you. But that doesn't mean I'm being dishonest. If I knew that in fact the US was more popular ten years ago but cited that study, that would be dishonest. I, in good faith, believe that the US is in fact less popular today than in 1997. It could turn out that I'm wrong but that doesn't mean I'm dishonest. The fact that there are lots of reasons for our unpopularity that I didn't explain isn't dishonest either. I didn't say that George Bush is the source of all evil in the world or that the US is unpopular solely because of the Iraq War or that there may be some ways in which the US is more popular today. That isn't relevant to my point, which was that foreigners may simplistically associate Hillary as the opposition to the current administration and as a proxy for a more popular past administration and support her for that reason. I didn't say they were rational or that we should support Hillary for that reason. Only that its reasonable to think Bill Clinton is telling the truth about what some foreign leaders have told him.

I think you have been intellectually dishonest in your exchange with me, NSC. I have a love/hate relationship with blog commenting. I see so much potential here for civil discourse and debate but most of the time it seems to be just a way to vent predisposed viewpoints and it allows people to desensitize themselves and decline to humanize or care about the people who espouse different views than your own. Whatever. Its a limit to the forum. I'm still attracted to it, but it still really annoys me too.

When Enigmaticore asked me to back up that latter claim, I cited the Pew study, which only goes back five years. I don't have another study going back ten years to show you. But that doesn't mean I'm being dishonest. If I knew that in fact the US was more popular ten years ago but cited that study, that would be dishonest. I, in good faith, believe that the US is in fact less popular today than in 1997. It could turn out that I'm wrong but that doesn't mean I'm dishonest.

Again, fair enough. If you did not purposefully mean to cloud the issue by quoting a five year study to prove at least a 10 year trend, then I withdraw my complaint about dishonesty. Perhaps you simply did not comprehend what the study said when you were reading it (sorry, I had to give back that little zinger).

And while you may have not named Bush as the cause of our alleged unpopularity in the world, certainly that is a central theme through all liberal complaints about our standing. If I wrongly stereotyped you in this regard I apologize.

Finally, I agree that it is hard to have a logical, civil discussion in comment sections. Mostly because you end up, as I did, answering two or more people in one comment and at times get quotes and comments and attitudes confused. It's not the best way to discuss an issue, especially when you get long threads like this one.

And you are correct about how this leads to dehuminizing the people you are debating. Your, "Dude, you need to work on your reading comprehension skills" did tend to set me a tad on edge. Perhaps that is what made me use the intellectually dishonest term . . . perhaps not.

I think it was more that your phrase "I just returned from abroad" is the way people talk when they went to Europe. "Abroad" -- why abroad? It's like the straight line for Chico Marx: "I just returned from abroad." Hey, what broad?

Well, then they would really, really like us, and all the money we'd give them, and all the times we'd turn our other cheek, and all the self-blame we'd cast for causing all of the world's problems.

If only France and Belgium and North Korea and Iran had more of a voice in our affairs, how much more likeable we'd be. We could bring the world plates of cookies and refill their coffee (no trouble, no trouble at all), and generally be the servant they want us to be. The everything would be all right!

Perhaps not. My snippy comment was in response to your accusation of dishonesty on my part.

True, well, at least partially. I did make that comment but I was confused as to who said what when as I noted earlier - it's not an excuse really, but certainly a reason.

So, since I am a man who admits when he has made a mistake, I withdraw the intellectually dishonest remark - assuming of course you didn't mean to purposefully use a five year study to prove a ten year or more trend. Perhaps we both need to work on our reading comprehension, ya think?

And while Ahmedinejad may not be a "darling" of the left, he certainly has more than his fair share of apologists, and indeed, supporters, there. A perfect example of which is the jewish lesbian who thinks he is a hunk despite the fact that he would kill her (Daily KOS diarist - I am not gonna link to that cesspool) or the guy at Columbia today with the sign that read "Ahmedinejad is bad, Bush is worse."

The left, especially in academia, LOVES tyrants - Hugo Chavez, Che Guevara, Ahmedinejad, Castro - surely you are not blind to this fact?